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Reflections on the Adaptation Futures Conference

With
realisation that mitigation alone might not be sufficient in tackling climate change;
adaptation has dominated recent international political and academic discourse on
climate change. Following the momentum of the historic Conference of Parties in
Paris in December, 2015, over 1600 participants from more than 100 countries, gathered
in the beautiful city of Rotterdam, the Netherlands, to share new scientific
findings, products and services aimed at promoting the business case for
climate change adaptation. Participants included academic researchers,
innovators, practitioners and decision-makers both in the private and public
sectors. Hosted by PROVIA (Global Programme of Research on Climate Change Vulnerability,
Impacts and Adaptation) and funded by the European Union and the Government of
the Netherlands, the theme of this conference was “adaptation futures 2016: practicesand solutions”.

Philip explaining CIRCLE’s business poster to a participant

The
conference had 155 sessions, 7 high-level round tables and, of course, the
highlight of it, the Adaptation Expo. There were seven key themes including food
and rural livelihoods, cities and infrastructure, fresh water availability and
access, ecosystems and ecosystem based adaptations, disaster risk reduction, the
artic, and public health. Additionally, there were three 3 cross-cutting issues
touching on risk assessment, adaptation planning and evaluation, institutions
and governance, and investment and business. One of the key highlights of this
conference was the address by Her Majesty Queen Maxima of the Netherlands, who
is the United Nations Secretary General’s Special Advocate for Inclusive
Finance for Development. In her address, HRH Queen Maxima emphasized the need
for the international community to provide all inclusive financial access to
the most vulnerable in our communities. As the keynote speaker, Queen Maxima
indicated that globally there are over 230 million people who are affected by
climate change induced disasters. She opined that access to financial services
by these people was critical for their survival.

Several
cutting edge studies conducted across the globe were presented. I participated
actively and made a presentation titled: “mapping the multiple stressors
contributing to vulnerability across scales in the Savannah zone of Ghana”. In this presentation, I explored how the
various climatic and non-climatic stressors vary and interact across three different
spatial scales in dry land farming systems, typified by case studies from northern
Ghana. This presentation outlined that smallholder households are confronted with
multiple stressors, many of which are non-climatic in nature. To this end, the
presentation highlighted the urgent and practical need to tackle both climatic and
non-climatic stressors in a holistic approach in climate change adaptation
policies.In addition to my academic presentation, I presented
CIRCLE’s business poster at the Adaptation Expo. It is important to stress that
CIRCLE’s business poster received considerable audience and participants were
generally impressed by the overall objective of the programme, which is aimed
at developing the capacity of early career researchers in climate change
impacts on development in sub-Saharan Africa.

Philip (middle) explaining a point on academic poster to participants

For me, two
key things made this conference a resounding success. First, the tool shed session,
where practitioners including NGOs such as CARE International, Oxfam (UK) and other
organisations such as the European Environment Agency, The World Bank,
Stockholm Environment Institute etc., demonstrated practical tools for
addressing various aspects of climate change vulnerability and adaptation.
Indeed, many of the tools were quite innovative and attracted large audiences. Another
fascinating feature of the Adaptation Futures Conference was the active participation
by the business community (including insurers, accountants, bankers etc.),
non-governmental organisations as well as policy makers. The participation of
these stakeholders was a clear demonstration that the issue of climate change is
not a problem only for academic researchers, but rather an all-encompassing
issue that needs a holistic approach involving all stakeholders.For instance, several sessions were devoted
to the role of insurance and business models in reducing the impacts of climate
change related risk on households, especially on poorer households. It is
believed that businesses could help in developing appropriate business models in
tackling climate change.

Additionally,
this conference outlined some of the key challenges in adapting to climate
change, the next steps and who should take the lead. In terms of challenges, a
number of challenges were highlighted including the lack of communication on climate
change, inadequate engagement amongst researchers and practitioners, as well as
lack of appreciation of local knowledge, etc. Personally, one of the refreshing
moments was meeting some of the key global leaders in adaptation literature that
I have cited several times in my writing. Importantly, the Adaptation Futures
Conference provided a good platform for forging new networks and renewing old
friendships. Crucially, new thinking and ideas on adaptation to climate change
emerged from this conference.

The next Adaptation
Futures Conference takes place in Cape Town, South Africa in 2018 and it will
be great to have a good representation of climate change adaptation researchers
and practitioners from the Africa continent attending this conference. In doing
this, the continent shall be demonstrating its commitments in contributing to
finding lasting solutions to climate change, which is already posing a
considerable threat to Africa’s poverty reduction, economic growth and social
development efforts.

Finally, I
wish to take this opportunity to express my profound gratitude to CIRCLE and
the organisers of the Adaptation Futures Conference for providing the necessary
support to enable me attend this important conference.

Dr Philip
Antwi-Agyei is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Environmental Science at
Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana and recently
completed a CIRCLE Visiting Fellowship at the University of Ghana.

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